


Now That the World is Over

by Ghost_in_the_Hella



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: After The Storm, Bae Ending, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Things get weird, Time Powers, Time Travel, bae over bay, flirting and angst, hella sweary, past-amberprice, plot is slow burn, pricefield, romance is slow burn, this action will have consequences, this whole thing is basically a smolder
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2019-05-17
Packaged: 2019-07-15 10:23:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16061126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghost_in_the_Hella/pseuds/Ghost_in_the_Hella
Summary: “Forever,” Max promises. And if this is true, if Chloe will always be with her, forever by her side, then it’s worth it. As monstrous as this is, she knows it’s the truth. She would make the same decision again. Again and again, every time. Staring into the otherworldly tempest steadily bearing down on their hometown, she’s not sure there’s anything in the world she wouldn’t do to keep Chloe alive and by her side, any sacrifice she’d be unwilling to make for her.---In the wake of the storm, Max and Chloe attempt to pick up the pieces and live with the consequences of their actions. But Arcadia Bay isn’t quite done with them.





	1. 1.1 All of This

**Author's Note:**

> This story is going to get massive. And messy. And weird. But also sweet and full of love. 
> 
> This is not a straight-up AU, but it’s canon-divergent in certain details. Most notably, it disregards the closing montage of episode 5 (Bae ending). Some more minor details also stray from canon, but most major canon events are upheld. Tip of the cap to the prolific and talented explosionshark for planting the seed of Chloe’s kit in Road to Home.
> 
> Also, happy 23rd birthday Max Caulfield! (depending on your time zone when this posts)

Act I: Dawn of Time  
Ch 1: All of This  
  
“This is _my_ storm. I _caused_ this... I caused _all of this_.” - Max Caulfield, LiS S1e5  
  
\---  
  
“Max… It’s time…” There’s a note of pleading in Chloe’s voice, but whether she’s pleading with Max to let her live or let her die Max isn’t sure. Her eyes are a vortex more consuming than the one bearing down on them, a precipice more precarious than the one on which they stand. She wants to die a hero, and she wants to live a coward; she wants to go back to a time when she was whole and everything made sense, and even though she hates with every fiber of her being that this decision isn’t in her own hands she’s grateful not to be the one to have to make this choice.  
  
A choice that Max has already made. Because this is _Chloe_ standing in front of her.  
  
Chloe, her captain; her best and truest friend, who took her back even after five years of selfish silence and neglect. Chloe, who has already suffered so much in her short life, has already lost and been lost so many times. Chloe, whose death was so unbearable to Max that she bent time itself to save her: again and again and again. Chloe, who drives every beat of her heart.  
  
Chloe, who wanted to drop a bomb on Arcadia Bay and watch it turn to glass.  
  
Max turns away from her, the rain-wet polaroid still in her hands. It would be so easy to grant her request. Already, stepping back in time is like stepping into a heated pool: warm and inviting and so quickly over her head. It would only take a little focus to go back and unmake everything. Let the photograph shimmer and open up to her, step back and let the storm unravel, let Chloe unravel, let her whole life unravel… She _hates_ how easy it would be.  
  
“Not anymore.”  
  
The photograph tears every bit as easily, as if that’s what it was made to do, the blue butterfly and Max’s reflection both splitting neatly into halves. The storm seizes the pieces before she has time to reflect on the consequences of this action, taking them from her hands like an offering and drawing them into its swirling mass.  
  
For a terrifying moment, there’s no sound other than the raging of the storm. Chloe isn’t saying _anything_ , and Max can’t bring herself to turn around and face her. The enormity of what Max has done hangs suspended between them, and Max fears that it will hang there forever, like the Sword of Damocles. It’s too much. Too big. Too terrible. She knows with a cold certainty that Chloe will never forgive her for making this decision - not after the way she implored Max to let her go. But she also knows that this was never really a choice. Either way, her world was going to be ripped apart. It was only a matter of whether it would be by grief or by the storm.  
  
And she’s seen Chloe die enough times this week to know one thing beyond all shadow of a doubt: she doesn’t want to live in any reality where Chloe isn’t alive. She _cannot_ let her die. She especially can’t let her die scared and abandoned on a bathroom floor, thinking that nobody loves her. Thinking that Max doesn’t love her.  
  
“Max…” Chloe steps forward slowly, sounding numb with disbelief. “I’ll always be with you.” Her voice trembles.  
  
“Forever,” Max promises. And if this is true, if Chloe will always be with her, forever by her side, then it’s worth it. As monstrous as this is, she knows it’s the truth. She would make the same decision again. Again and again, every time. Staring into the otherworldly tempest steadily bearing down on their hometown, she’s not sure there’s anything in the world she wouldn’t do to keep Chloe alive and by her side, any sacrifice she’d be unwilling to make for her.  
  
Chloe takes Max’s hand in hers, and the gesture is so natural and familiar that it could be any other day, any other moment in their years of friendship. If their hands weren’t so cold, and wet, and trembling. If the sky weren’t grey and alive with electricity. If their ears weren’t full of thunder.  
  
As the storm draws closer to the shore, buildings rip loose from their foundations and leap into its arms. It isn’t a vision this time. It’s real. Max’s storm is real, and it’s happening, and suddenly she can’t watch this anymore.  
  
She clutches Chloe like a lifeline, burying her face in the crook of Chloe’s neck. Chloe pulls her close and cradles her in the safety of her arms. She holds onto Max tightly and lets her hide against her shoulder, her tears the only warmth that she can feel.  
  
Max has already seen all of this; she doesn’t need to see it all again. But Chloe never has. She watches. She can’t look away.  
  
She watches, and she holds Max. She means to be the one anchoring Max, but as she watches the storm slowly and deliberately cut a swath of destruction through their town she wonders if it’s really the other way around. Max’s hand trails slowly up and down her back, but whether it’s to soothe herself or Chloe neither of them knows.  
  
Time passes. An hour, two, more. It’s impossible to say.  
  
Rain still pelts down. The wind still grabs and tears. Max can hear the storm chewing its way through Arcadia Bay, but it doesn’t feel real anymore. _She_ doesn’t feel real anymore. She feels like she’s floating. Or sinking. Or both. She can barely feel Chloe’s arm around her. Chloe’s saying something to her, but she sounds like she’s a mile away. Max tries to respond, but she’s not sure her mouth is forming actual words.  
  
She’s hungry, she realizes, and at the same moment her guts twist with nausea. Is it totally messed up to be standing in the middle of a raging storm that’s destroying the town she grew up in and feel hungry rather than afraid? She tries to ask Chloe because maybe she can help her make sense of it, but her tongue feels cold and heavy and her teeth are chattering and she’s pretty sure now that, no, the sounds she’s making aren’t words.  
  
It’s been a long, exhausting day. Max really just wants to lay down and go to sleep. Chloe’s yelling something she feels like she should understand. A short word, familiar. “Max! MAX!”  
  
Things get a bit fuzzy after that. At some point Max watches Chloe attack the lighthouse door with her shoulder. She’s upside down. It’s sort of absurd-looking, Chloe charging again and again at the door with the ground in the air and lightning flashing around her head like a halo, defying gravity. Max wishes she had her camera with her.  
  
Where _is_ her camera, anyway? She should be taking pictures.  
  
Not quite warm. Quieter. Max can feel that she’s shivering now. How long has she been shivering like this for? Someone should call a doctor. This can’t be normal.  
  
Chloe’s voice. Safe and warm, the warmest she’s been. Max lets go of the last thread of consciousness and, for the first time in days, falls into a dreamless sleep.  
  
The first thing that Max notices when she wakes is that it’s quiet. If the storm is still happening, she isn’t in the middle of it anymore. The second thing she notices is that she’s warm and dry, or close enough to it. The third thing she notices is Chloe snuggled up behind her.  
  
Was everything a dream? The last day, hell, the last week has all been so surreal that she can almost believe that none of it really happened. The only thing that feels real to her is Chloe’s breath, warm and steady in her hair, Chloe’s fingers interlaced with her own and holding on firmly, Chloe’s… Wait, maybe this is the dream.  
  
Max opens her eyes. The room around her is vaguely familiar but someplace she hasn’t been since she was a child. She can’t quite place it. She’s definitely never seen it from this angle: lying on the ground, wrapped in some sort of weird space-age shiny blanket. She’s pretty sure the last time she saw it, there also weren’t wet clothes hanging from every surface. An image flashes in front of her eyes like lightning: Chloe throwing her shoulder against the door of the lighthouse. It must have worked.  
  
Not a dream, then. Max breathes a sigh of relief. She still feels cold and tired, her thoughts still jumbled and slow to form, but she knows that Chloe is with her and they’re both safe, and that’s all that’s important for her to know right now. The feeling of Chloe’s fingers tangled with hers brings a smile to her lips and a warm glow to her chest that feels like in time it could thaw the pervasive coldness of her limbs.  
  
The lighthouse. It makes a poetic kind of sense that that’s where they would find shelter from the storm. Her eyes rove over her surroundings as she basks in the warmth of Chloe’s embrace, seeking out familiar shapes from their shared childhood. Sluggish and numb, her brain struggles to fit together the pieces of what she sees; seeing it all sideways doesn’t help. The winding staircase is familiar, but the dripping clothes strewn over its railing puzzle her. The longer she looks at them, the more sure she is that they’re not supposed to be there at all. A thought chisels its way into her brain and she tries to move her arm to lift the blanket covering her. Chloe’s arm is so heavy on hers that she can’t manage more than a twitch.  
  
Chloe feels her stirring. “Oh thank god,” she whispers. “Max? Are you still with me?”  
  
Max moves her lips slowly, testing them. They don’t feel numb anymore. “I…” Her voice is a little rough. She tries to clear her throat. “Yeah. I think so.”  
  
Chloe’s arms tighten around her. “Jesus fucking Christ, Max, don’t ever do that to me again.”  
  
“O-okay…”  
  
Chloe wiggles her fingers between Max’s. “Ten fingers, ten toes? Still got them all?”  
  
“I… What?” Max tries to push through the fog still clouding her brain. “What’re you talking about?”  
  
“I did my best, Max, but I’m no doctor. And you were… _really_ fucking cold. Like, _scary_ cold.” Chloe gently squeezes each of Max’s fingers, one at a time. “I don’t think you lost anything, though.” She presses the tops of her feet against the bottoms of Max’s. “Toes feel okay?”  
  
“They feel like toes.” Max presses back against Chloe’s feet to prove it.  
  
“Good thing, because they felt like fucking ice cubes before.” Chloe lets go of Max’s hand and touches her ear. Max jumps a little in surprise. “Does that hurt?” Chloe asks, her voice tight with concern.  
  
“No, just… Wasn’t expecting it.”  
  
“Sorry. Just wanted to make sure it didn’t fall off or anything. You can still feel it okay? I tried to keep as much of you covered as I could, but...”  
  
“I can definitely still feel it.” Max wonders if Chloe can feel the way her heartbeat has ratcheted up. Her fingertips still linger on Max’s ear, so that’s a strong maybe. “Um, Chloe…” Max clears her throat. “I’m kind of afraid to ask, but… Am I, uh…”  
  
“Are you… what?”  
  
“Am I, uh… A-are you…? Are we…?”  
  
Chloe tenses a little. “Oh, right. That. Yeah, but get your mind out of the gutter. I may have failed Life Skills pretty hard, but even I know you don’t leave someone with hypothermia in wet clothes.”  
  
“Oh.” If there was a hole in the ground, Max would crawl into it.  
  
“Honestly, I was in too much of a panic to get you warm and dry to pay much attention, anyway.” There’s an awkward silence. “Uh, you feeling warm now?”  
  
Max nods. “Mhm.” She’s afraid that if she tries to speak, her voice will betray her.  
  
“Guess my work here is done, then…” Chloe shifts away, tucking the emergency blanket snugly around Max as she does. “You, uh, might want to close your eyes if you’re feeling shy about it. Preserve some of the mystery.”  
  
Max closes her eyes. She listens to Chloe’s footsteps as she pads barefoot around the small room, gathering her clothes.  
  
“I mean, I know this probably isn’t how you _wanted_ to get me naked the first time, anyway, so…”  
  
“ _What?_ ” Max’s eyes pop open reflexively, then she squeezes them shut again.  
  
“Ah, you can still blush! I’ll take that as a sign of health.”  
  
“You, um, want to grab me my clothes while you’re at it?”  
  
“Our clothes are still really wet, actually. Probably not a great idea. But don’t worry! I’ve got backup clothes in the truck.” Chloe kneels down and ruffles Max’s damp hair. “I knew my zombie preparedness kit would come in handy someday.”  
  
Max snorts. “‘Zombie preparedness kit?’ I want to say you’re joking, but somehow I don’t think you are.” She cautiously opens an eye, then opens the other when she sees that Chloe is back in her clothes.  
  
“You know me too well, Max. You gonna be okay on your own for a bit? Truck’s parked down by the beach still.” Chloe grimaces. “Or at least I hope it is.”  
  
The beach. Sand ripping itself from the ground, water pouring upward from the ocean, spiraling, grasping-- “ _Wait_.” Max reaches out and grabs Chloe’s wrist. “The storm. You shouldn’t go out there. It’s too dangerous.”  
  
“It’s okay, Max.” Chloe gently touches Max’s hand still firmly wrapped around her other wrist, running a thumb over her knuckles. “I’m pretty sure it’s over. It’s been quiet out there for a while now.” Max’s grip tightens. “I’ll check first. Don’t worry, I’m not going to go running out into a fucking tornado. Have a little faith in my sense of self-preservation.”  
  
Max laughs, and it hurts. “Chloe, after this week I wouldn’t trust you to not stick a fork in an electrical outlet.”  
  
“Ouch. That burns, Max.” Chloe chuckles. “Although so did sticking a fork in that outlet.”  
  
“Wait, what? Really?”  
  
“Story for another time.” Chloe pats her hand, then gently pries her wrist free. Max watches her anxiously as she walks over to the door and starts working loose the chair wedged between the door and the wall. It takes a couple of minutes and a fair amount of swearing. Once the chair isn’t bracing the door shut, it creaks just slightly open on its own. It swings in gently, an act of gravity rather than gale-force winds. Chloe opens it a few inches further and peers out. After a short silence, she clears her throat. “Looks clear. Still drizzling a little, but otherwise… calm. Shit, I think I even see some blue sky.” She turns and looks at Max. “I’ll only be gone for a little while. Okay?”  
  
“ _Promise_.”  
  
Chloe walks back over to her and hooks her pinky in Max’s, her hand still dangling loose from under the blanket. “I promise. I’ll be back as soon as possible, and I’ll bring supplies.” She hesitates, then leans over and presses her lips briefly against Max’s forehead. “You rest up. Keep warm. I’ll be back before you know it.” She gently tucks Max’s hand back into the blanket.  
  
Max tries to stay awake, counting the minutes in her head. But it’s surprisingly warm in the blanket, and it still smells like Chloe, and soon she falls back asleep.  
  
Max dreams.


	2. 1.2 Ache

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe ventures out to get supplies from her truck. She *really* needs a smoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy last day of Strange Week! Appropriately enough, it's *storming* in my corner of the world. I figured since today is October 11th and this chapter (and the next couple) also takes place on October 11th, it's a good day to post. Fair warning, this chapter is heavy on the angst without much to lighten it. Next one will have more fluff. Hold tight until then.

Act I: Dawn of Time  
Ch 2: Ache  
  
  
Chloe would kill for a cigarette.  
  
Chloe would kill for a dry cigarette, because the pack of them in her pocket is predictably soaked, leaving every smoke in it limp and wet. She chews on one anyway, because maybe the gesture itself will be enough to get her through the long, cold slog down the hill.  
  
The climb down feels longer than the climb up, which surprises her. On the way up the adrenaline rush of half-carrying, half-dragging Max through a storm straight out of a disaster movie must have dulled her sense of time. She feels every second on the way down.  
  
Max. Fucking hell, Max.  
  
It all feels so unreal. _Everything_ from the moment Max came back into her life has felt unreal. She wouldn’t trade a second of it, though, not for a huge stack of cash and a lifetime supply of weed and booze. Not for… Fuck.  
  
Chloe bites clean through the wet cigarette. It falls to pieces all over the front of her tank top, a sodden mess clinging to the damp fabric. Gagging, she spits out the filter caught behind her teeth. She brushes at her shirt, flicking off as much as she can. She would kill for a dry cigarette and five minutes of quiet in her head.  
  
She has to be careful as she picks her way down the hill. Branches litter the way. Some of them as big as trees, hell, some of them probably _were_ trees. An upended bench, planted at least a foot into the ground. She thinks it might’ve been the one that sat next to the lighthouse, but it’s at least a third of the way down the hill now. She’s astounded by how little damage the lighthouse itself took, considering that the shack behind it had been basically razed to the ground. She’s never believed in miracles, but the more she sees of the devastation left in the wake of the storm, the more miraculous the fact of her continued existence feels. It’s… fucking _unnatural_ , really.  
  
With her own eyes, she saw the buildings being swept up into the storm like tinker-toys in the hands of a child. Stores, houses, schools. Places where people worked and lived. She still can’t really process it in a way that makes any sense. The storm was real. The rain still lightly falling, hardly more than a heavy mist, is real. The destruction all around her is real.  
  
It could have been her.  
  
It should have been her.  
  
She doubles up suddenly, guilt buried in her gut like a fist. She staggers and drops to one knee. Cold mud seeps into her pants.  
  
She would kill for a dry cigarette and to never have to think about this storm again.  
  
After a couple of minutes of hissing breath through her teeth, Chloe forces herself back up onto her feet and keeps walking. Finally, she reaches the parking lot. It’s not as badly flooded as she would have expected, but it’s still a mess of massive puddles, downed tree limbs, and wet sand dredged up from the beach. There’s a red car with its wheels in the air, helpless as a turtle on its back. It’s empty, she hopes. She makes herself duck down and peek through the shattered windows. Nobody home. It’s a good thing, too, because she doesn’t think she could handle seeing any dead bodies today and somehow she doesn’t think she could handle meeting any other survivors, either. It’s hard enough to take care of herself and Max, never mind introducing a potentially badly injured stranger into the mix.   
  
She’s not sure she could stand the guilt.  
  
Fliers litter the ground everywhere, fliers she recognizes immediately: she’s been papering the town with them for months, after all. They bloat and disintegrate in puddles. They’re plastered to trees, blown there by the wind and glued in place by the rain. She tries not to look at them. It doesn’t matter that they’re falling apart, she tells herself. They won’t help now, anyway. It makes her sick to see them that way, even so.  
  
The truck is… _not_ where she parked it. It takes her a few heart-in-throat minutes to find it. Its tires are on the ground, which is promising. It’s pressed pretty firmly against a tree a couple hundred feet from where she had left it, which is less promising.   
  
“Shit. Shit, shit, _shit_.” Chloe walks around to inspect the damage. It doesn’t look as bad as she feared, a fairly large dent on the side of the truck bed, which is basically a small swimming pool now. “Fuuuuuuck.” She unlocks the tailgate and drops it down. “Fuck!” Water cascades out, soaking her already-damp boots before she can hop back and away.   
  
She would kill for a dry cigarette and a dry pair of shoes.  
  
The driver’s side door doesn’t look too badly damaged, but it’s too close to the treeline to safely open it. Chloe marches back around to the passenger’s side. She flings the door open, then leans in and opens the glovebox. Her pack of emergency smokes is still in there and, mercifully, dry. She heaves a sigh of relief, then sprawls across the broad bench seat of the cab. It isn’t until she pulls out her lighter and it takes her eight increasingly frustrating attempts to get it to light that she realizes how badly her hands are shaking. Finally the tip of the cigarette catches and glows. She allows her body to sag into the seat and takes a long drag, filling her lungs with an aching warmth.  
  
She knows she should grab the kit and rush back to Max, but fuck… She just needs five minutes. Just five minutes of peace. Five minutes without a storm ripping the world apart, without guilt crushing all the air out of her lungs, without her life being in danger, without Max being in danger…  
  
Pressure builds behind her eyes. She takes another drag and tries to relax.   
  
Max. She wonders if this is how Max felt after she saved her life the first time. Strangely powerful, life and death in her hands, and yet… so strangely helpless and afraid.   
  
She’d really thought that Max was a goner. She really thought that Max was going to slip right through her fingers. That Max had saved her worthless life only to lose her own in turn.  
  
She’d be damned if she was going to let that happen.  
  
Chloe pulls herself up into a sitting position. She fishes her key out of her pocket and twiddles it in her fingers for a minute, contemplating the amount of water in the truck bed. The water level hadn’t quite reached the top of the bed, and even though the storm passed through just a few hours ago the area already isn’t particularly flooded. Still, that was a hell of a lot of water all at once, and she can’t really gauge how high the water reached before it receded. Plus there’s the unknown factor of how hard her truck was thrown against the tree, and what else it might have hit along the way. She sighs down at the tiny panda on her keychain. “Probably shouldn’t press our luck, hmm?” she mutters around her cigarette. She reaches down next to her seat and pops the hood open, pocketing her key once more as she slides back across the bench seat. She smokes the cigarette down to the filter, then stubs it out on the dashboard, flicking it into the parking lot as she climbs back out through the passenger’s side.   
  
Chloe stops to check the trees next to the truck. As far as she can tell, it doesn’t look like the water reached more than a couple of feet deep on their trunks, but everything is so wet from the rain that it’s hard to distinguish a clear waterline. She swings the hood up all the way and props it open. The graffiti of a lion’s face stares back at her, drawn around an old gunk stain on the underside of the hood. She flinches at the sight of it. “Hey, Leo,” she says halfheartedly, avoiding looking at it directly. “Sorry about the storm, buddy…”  
  
Gazing into the exposed inner workings of her trusty vehicle, she digs into a dusty memory from her childhood of helping her father check his car after an especially nasty storm had briefly flooded their street. She’s had many occasions over the past few years to be grateful for her memories of helping William repair his car; as painful as it still is to think of him - and especially to think of his car - the skills she picked up have served her well. Still, she wishes she’d paid more attention at the time: she could be genuinely good at this by now instead of merely competent.   
  
She disconnects the battery ground strap and starts inspecting the engine for signs of water damage. Nothing seems obviously wet, but things do look like they’ve been knocked around a bit. Hopefully nothing a few more layers of duct tape won’t fix. She checks the dipsticks for water droplets. As far as she can tell they look fine. “So far so good.” She reattaches the strap and closes the hood. She double-checks the headlights for signs of moisture, then opens the door and slides herself back along the seat until she’s behind the wheel, pulling her key out again. “Okay,” she says, “Moment of truth. Here goes nothing.” She puts the key in the ignition and turns it. The truck hacks and sputters for a while. “Fuck.” Chloe lets it rest for a minute, then tries again. Same result. “Goddamnit.” Chloe folds her arms over the steering wheel and rests her head on them. “Guess you’re gonna need a little TLC before we can make a break for it, huh?” She sighs in defeat. “Fine. Max probably isn’t up for a road trip yet anyway. Be nice to have a lift to the hospital, though. If there still is one.” She turns the key a third time and lets it cough for a while longer before she gives up.   
  
The truck bed is still dripping, but it isn’t flooded anymore. Chloe heaves herself up into it, the truck groaning under her weight but holding steady. She’s surprised to find that the cardboard box that held the fliers now scattered throughout the parking lot is still in there, albeit on its side and disintegrating into a pile of mush in the back corner, along with the remaining fliers. She avoids touching it as she finds what she came for and reaches for it: a large, red box packed with emergency supplies, hidden under an olive green wool fire blanket now soaked through from the storm. She peels the wet blanket off and chuckles. “ **Fuck off, Zombies** ” is scrawled in bold black marker along the top of the box. “Haters gonna hate, but I knew you’d come in handy someday.” She picks it up, but it’s heavier than she’d imagined and after hauling Max around for half the day her arms have nothing more to give. She just barely manages to set it down rather than dropping it. There’s no way she’ll be able to lug it all the way back up to the lighthouse.   
  
“Okay, just the essentials then. Food, water, maybe the flashlight… and dry clothes.” Dropping to her knees, she unclasps the lid and prepares to open it, taking a deep, shaky breath.  
  
She already wants another cigarette. Would another five minutes be too much to ask?  
  
She thinks guiltily of Max alone in the lighthouse. She’s probably worried about her by now. This shouldn’t be taking her so long. What if Max decides that something’s wrong? What if she tries to come find her? She’s too weak for that. She’ll get hurt, or even…  
  
Food. Water. Flashlight. Clothes. Chloe pushes the lid open with determination. She grabs a couple of pouches of food, some granola bars, a water bottle, a bulky flashlight that she hopes still works, and… and...  
  
And here’s the real reason why she’s been dragging her feet for so long. Because there are two sets of clothes in the emergency kit: one for her, and one for…  
  
Rachel.  
  
She prods that wound experimentally. It’s still fresh. It feels like she’s had a tooth pulled without any anaesthesia, if her heart had a mouth.   
  
Chloe sinks into the truck bed. The cold cuts right into her skin, but she doesn’t care. She lays out flat on her back and looks up at the heavy gray sky. How many days had she lain just like this, with Rachel by her side? How many nights?   
  
And now never again.  
  
She doesn’t even remember taking Rachel’s clothes out of the kit, but she finds herself cradling them. She buries her face in them, trying to catch a scent of her. They’ve been in the kit for at least a year, possibly more. They shouldn’t smell like much of anything: plastic, maybe, or possibly even mildew. But Chloe swears she can still smell a hint of jasmine on them.   
  
The wound feels less like a missing tooth and more like a bullet hole, now. Chloe curls into a fetal position, hemorrhaging tears into Rachel’s clothes, keening and wailing like a lost soul.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, that was a bit of a rough one. Such Rachel feels. Next one at least has some good moments of fluff and pricefield flirty banter goodness (aaaaand some more Rachel feels; that’s kind of a big thing in this story). And to tide you over until then, I’ll be posting a sweet Halloween story soon, hopefully before actual Halloween. A side of fluff for all the angst.


	3. 1.3 Checkpoint

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Max and Chloe start to settle into their temporary new abode. Still 10/11, several hours after the storm has passed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, angst and feels plus fluff and flirting. Enjoy.

  
Act I: Dawn of Time  
Ch 3: Checkpoint  
  
When Max wakes up, Chloe isn’t there. She has no way of knowing how long Chloe’s been gone - dreaming has a curious way of undoing time even under normal circumstances - but it feels like she’s been gone for too long. It’s uncomfortably quiet in the lighthouse. Max thinks if she could listen hard enough she might be able to hear even the stirring of dust motes in the air. She supposes she should be grateful for the silence, but it makes her uneasy. She wishes Chloe would hurry up and get back already. If anyone can fill a silence, it’s Chloe.  
  
The longer Max lies awake on the floor, the more anxious she gets about Chloe not being back yet. She’s lost Chloe too many times this week to not worry that something bad will happen to her the moment she’s out of sight. Finally Max can’t stand it anymore. The stillness, the silence, the solitude: it’s too much. She can’t just lie there alone with her thoughts anymore. Max swaddles herself in the mylar emergency blanket and gingerly gets to her feet. Her head swims a bit at first, but she’s able to keep herself steady.   
  
There isn’t much to the room apart from the winding staircase leading up. Her clothes are still draped over its railing. She touches her jeans: still sopping wet. Her shirt and underclothes aren’t quite as bad; under other circumstances she might put them on anyway, but in her head she can still hear the fear in Chloe’s voice, telling her how cold she’d been. She feels a lot better now, her head clearer, but she’s still exhausted and feeling weaker than she’d like. It isn’t worth the risk. If nothing else, it would probably freak Chloe out. Whenever she gets back.   
  
_If_ she gets back.  
  
Max wrangles her phone out of the pocket of her pants. It probably would’ve been smarter for her to put it in her messenger bag before the storm, she thinks, although truth be told her bag looks every bit as wet as her jeans. Wetter, even: it’s still dripping. She tries to turn the phone on and… nothing. Stone dead. She’s not surprised, but it was worth a shot. She contemplates opening up her messenger bag to assess the damage, but she can picture so vividly the water pouring out of her camera - William’s camera - that it turns her stomach. She isn’t quite ready for that yet.   
  
The emergency blanket makes all kinds of ridiculous crinkling noises as she slowly and deliberately explores her surroundings. The absurdity of it - walking around in the lighthouse wearing nothing but what amounts to a giant roll of foil - helps to distract her from the horrorshow that is this day. The uneven stone floor is cold against her bare feet, but she’s grateful to be able to feel it. She’s grateful the lighthouse is still standing.  
  
Max remembers running up these winding stairs with Chloe, many years ago. Sneakers thudding up the steps. Giddy laughter that made her sides ache. Chloe always made it a race, and she always won. Max would always freeze, breathless, when she neared the top of the stairs. Chloe would always be waiting for her at the top. That high up, the stairs changed: they grew steeper, more frightening. Max would never have gone up them at all if Chloe didn’t call down to her, egging her on. “C’mon, Maxine! I dare you! I _double_ dare you!” Max never could resist Chloe’s dares.  
  
The view was always worth it in the end.  
  
The lighthouse feels so different now. It used to be their playground, and now it’s their shelter from the storm. Max barely even gave this room a passing glance as a child; she and Chloe just went straight for the stairs, eager to get to the top and look down over the Bays of Arrrcadia, pretending to be in the crow’s nest of their pirate ship. Max is fairly sure she can’t handle the stairs right now, and she definitely can’t handle the stress it would put Chloe through if she found out she’d exerted herself that way in her absence. So instead she continues pacing slowly around the small, circular room at the base of the lighthouse, investigating the details of her surroundings.  
  
The room is, in a word, utilitarian. Emergency lights line the ceiling, shedding a dull orange light. As far as Max can see, they seem to follow the curve of the stairwell as well. Along the wall Max finds a fire extinguisher, an AED unit, and an empty bracket that Max presumes held the first aid kit that’s been dumped onto the floor. The emergency blanket must have come from there. Bandaids and small packets of ointments are scattered on the floor around the open kit where it’s been abandoned.   
  
There’s a small rack of informational brochures about the lighthouse and its history leaning against the curving wall. It stands next to a rickety-looking welcome desk with a rolling chair behind it and one wooden chair in front of it, the twin of the one Chloe had used to wedge the broken door shut. On the other side of the desk, there’s a door leading to the smallest bathroom that Max has ever seen. When she opens the door inward, it only opens part-way before the toilet stops it. She squeezes herself into the room to inspect it, careful not to catch the blanket on the door. Once inside, she can barely turn around in the gap between the sink and the toilet. The paper towel dispenser is nearly empty, in contrast to the wastebasket overflowing with crumpled towels. The liquid hand soap dispenser is slightly better, being nearly half-full. The toilet paper roll hanging next to the toilet is also about half finished, but she’s relieved to find a spare roll wedged between the sink and the pipe under it. She turns the taps on the sink and is shocked and delighted to find that water flows from it. It’s ice cold but it’s running water, and that’s more than she had hoped for after the storm. She resists the temptation to splash the water on her face to refresh herself: she’s pretty sure dousing herself with cold water after a brush with hypothermia would be a bad idea.  
  
Before she returns to the main room, her reflection in the small, filthy mirror above the sink catches her eye. She looks even worse than she’d expected. Her hair is a mess, her skin even more than usually pale, and the circles under her eyes as dark as bruises. Her narrow shoulders look bony, almost skeletal. She draws the blanket up over them, embarrassed, and frees one hand to futilely attempt to smooth her hair down. No wonder Chloe’s so worried about her. She looks _awful_. Like she hasn’t had a proper meal or a decent night’s sleep in a month. Is this an “I-almost-just-died” thing, or is it an “I’ve-been-abusing-my-mysterious-time-powers” thing, she wonders. Uncomfortable with the hollow-eyed strangeness of her reflection, Max takes one last pointless swipe at her tangled hair and returns to the main room, struggling through the narrow opening of the door and turning to close it after her.  
  
The lighthouse door scrapes open behind her, and Max turns toward the sound. “Your hero has returned!” Chloe keeps her tone light-hearted, but even in the low light Max can see that her eyes look red and puffy. “Hey, you’re up!” Chloe walks in and sets down a sizeable bundle of supplies on the floor. “You feeling better?” Her knees are a mess of mud, her clothes look wetter than when she left, and she absolutely stinks of cigarettes. Max practically dives into her arms. “Woah, hey! Take it easy, Tiger.” She returns Max’s embrace, briefly tangling her fingers in Max’s still-damp hair. “You almost knocked me right off my feet. You should be resting.”  
  
“I’m just… _so_ glad you’re here,” she mumbles into the warmth of Chloe’s shoulder.  
  
Chloe relaxes into the hug, resting her cheek against the top of Max’s head. “I’m glad you’re here, too. Ya big goop.” She squeezes Max, then lets go and steps away. “Now, come on, let’s get you into some dry clothes. You keep hugging me dressed like that, I’m gonna end up with a tinfoil fetish.”   
  
“You’re ridiculous.”  
  
“And you’re blushing again. Careful, Caulfield, that kind of thing goes to a girl’s head.” Chloe squats down and unties her bundle, pulling items out and setting them on the ground. Max smiles when the faded black fabric of the bundle unfurls, revealing itself to be a somewhat weathered Jolly Roger. “I couldn’t carry the whole zombie kit--”  
  
“Are you _really_ going to keep calling it that?”  
  
“--but I grabbed enough to get us through tomorrow afternoon at least,” Chloe continues without acknowledging the interruption. “Think you can handle food? I’ve mostly got granola bars, but there’s a couple of these soup things, too.” She holds up a retort package of beef stew and squishes it demonstratively. “They’re pretty soft, if that’s easier. Better heated up, but whatever. And I’ve got a flashlight in case the emergency lights go out. Hopefully it still works. And, um, clothes.” She hesitates, then picks up one of the piles of folded clothes and sets it before Max without looking at her. “I’ve got a shammy in here, too, you can use to dry your hair better. It isn’t the cleanest thing in the world, but at least it’s dry. And you can wear my backup beanie, too. Keep your head warm.” She tosses an olive green beanie down on top of the clothes.  
  
“Chloe, you’re amazing.”  
  
Chloe shrugs. “Not really. I just like to be ready, y’know, in case I ever need to go off the grid.”  
  
“No, really, I mean it. Not just for getting the supplies and bringing them up here, but… everything. For taking care of me in the storm, getting me out of the rain…”  
  
“It wasn’t a big deal.”  
  
“You broke a door down for me.”  
  
“I like breaking things. And technically I only broke the lock. Knock it off, Max; you know compliments give me a headache.”  
  
“You saved my life.”  
  
“Yeah, well, even if that’s true we’re still far from being even on that score.” Chloe gets to her feet, still dodging Max’s eyes.   
  
“But you did it without any help. You didn’t have any magical, fucked up superpowers; you just… knew what to do to save me, and you did it. That’s _amazing_. _You’re_ amazing.”   
  
Max reaches for Chloe’s hand, but Chloe steps toward the door. “Seriously, it’s not a big deal. Rachel’s, um. She was really into, like, hiking and camping, stuff like that. Taught me some basic survival skills so I wouldn’t, y’know. Get us eaten by a bear or anything.”  
  
There’s a sore spot there that Max knows not to press right now. Instead, she kneels carefully and picks up the offered pile of clothes. There’s a large damp spot on the front of the shirt. She touches it curiously. “Is it still raining out there?”  
  
“...Um. Sure. Little bit.” Chloe turns quickly. “I’ll, ah, wait outside. While you get changed.” Her voice sounds tight. Her shoulders are tense.  
  
“In the rain? Are you sure?”  
  
“I’ll be fine. Honestly, I’m dying for another smoke.” Chloe tries for a reassuring smile, but it comes out looking ghoulish. “I’ll be right outside if you need me.” She’s out the door before Max can protest further. She leaves the door open a couple of inches so that Max can see she’s not going far, keeping her back to the opening and lighting her cigarette.  
  
Max doesn’t take her eyes off of her. If she blinks she might be gone again. She changes into the clothes Chloe brought her as quickly as she can, feeling a bit shy even though nobody else is around and Chloe is making a point of giving her privacy. She towels off her hair as thoroughly as possible with the shammy, caring less than she would have expected that it’s stained and smells a bit like motor oil. Is it weird to sniff your best friend’s hat before putting it on? Max suspects it probably is, double-checking to make sure Chloe’s back is still turned before doing it anyway. It smells like cigarettes and pot smoke and Chloe’s hair when she hasn’t had time for a shower. It should probably be off-putting, but it comforts her.   
  
However Chloe might try to deny it, she _is_ amazing. She’s a goddamned miracle. And Max isn’t going to let her out of her sight.   
  
“The coast is clear, Captain Bluebeard. Come back inside.”  
  
Chloe glances over her shoulder, blowing out a long stream of smoke. “Yeah? You’re decent?” She takes one last drag on her cigarette, blazing it down to the filter, then drops it to the ground and crushes it out under her boot. “Not gonna greet me at the door wearing nothing but a tinfoil toga again, are you?” She pushes the door open. When she sees Max, her smile twitches. She clears her throat. Her eyes dart away. “Yeah, that’s… good. That should help keep you warm.” Her voice is stiff, the humor drained out of it.  
  
There’s something in the way her posture shifts that breaks Max’s heart. The way her arms fold over her chest, not to be defiant or cocky but to shield herself. The way her shoulders sag like they’re bearing the weight of the world. The way she’ll look anywhere but at Max.  
  
“What’s the matter?”  
  
“Nothing.”  
  
Max steps forward, reaching to touch Chloe’s arm. Chloe whips her arm away and steps back, bumping against the wall. “Chloe, what--”  
  
“Don’t--” Chloe leans against the wall, pretending that was what she meant to be doing all along. “You shouldn’t touch me. My clothes are still wet.”  
  
“Are you cereal right now?”  
  
Chloe laughs in spite of herself. “You are such a fucking dork.”  
  
“True, but I’m not going to shatter into a million pieces just because your clothes are a little wet.”  
  
Chloe glances at her, then away again. “You might.”  
  
Max studies her for a long, silent moment. Even though Chloe’s eyes are averted, the redness of them is still visible. Max tugs at the front of the shirt Chloe brought back for her. It’s still damp there. “It isn’t raining anymore, is it.”  
  
Chloe sucks her lower lip between her teeth and doesn’t say anything.  
  
And really Max has known it since the moment Chloe set the clothes out for her. The style of them is familiar, and the fit of them. And the scent. “These are her clothes, aren’t they. Rachel’s.”  
  
Chloe gives a guilty swallow and nods with a single, stiff jerk of her head.  
  
“Chloe, I…” Max doesn’t know what to say. She wants to go to Chloe and wrap her in a hug that will make everything okay, but she knows that that would only upset her more right now. “I’m so sorry.”  
  
Chloe nods again. A deep, wracking sob escapes her. She clenches and unclenches her fists. She keeps her mouth shut tight to prevent any more sobbing, instead huffing each hard breath through her nose. Max wants to tell her that it’s okay for her to cry, but she can’t get the words out. Chloe squeezes her eyes shut for a long time. When her breathing finally calms, she opens them and looks at Max, forcing her eyes to stay on her. “I know. It’s… not your fault.” She takes a deep breath and lets it out, slow and shaky. “It’s just… _hard_ seeing you dressed like that.” Her jaw clenches and her eyes sheepishly slip away again. “Last time, y’know, it was... kind of hot, dressing you up in her clothes,” she confesses. She shakes her head, face twisted with disgust. “But now… Now that I know she’s…” A muscle in her jaw pulses as she grinds her teeth for a few seconds, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “It’s just… **_hard_**.”  
  
It’s then that Max realizes how little time has passed for Chloe since they found Rachel. She can hardly keep track of how long it’s been for herself: she’s moved back and forth in time so much that it might be full weeks since she lived through that horrible moment. But for Chloe it’s only been, what, a day? Not even that? And Chloe had loved her. Loves her still. She pushes down a selfish flicker of jealousy. She knows all too well, better than most people would, how it feels to see someone you love ripped away from you. She can’t fault Chloe for her pain. She wouldn’t fault her for wanting to rip the whole damn world apart.  
  
She doesn’t reach out to Chloe again. She simply is _there_. Eventually, Chloe reaches out and touches Max’s hand. She glances up again, finding Max’s eyes, and manages a faint smile. “You do look really cute in my hat, though.”  
  
Max squeezes her fingers gently. “Thanks.”  
  
Chloe squeezes back. She drops her hand back to her side and clears her throat. “Anyway… I should probably get changed myself. These clothes are starting to chafe like you wouldn’t believe. And you don’t even want to know where.”   
  
Max chuckles and shakes her head fondly. “Okay, sure. You want me to wait outside?”  
  
“ _No_.” Chloe’s response is so firm that it startles them both. “I mean-- It’s still kinda cold out there, and…” Max gives her a skeptical look. “You…” Chloe sighs. “Look, just stay in here for now. You don’t want to go out there yet. It’s… not a pretty scene.” She gives Max a smile that almost manages to mask her anxiety with a veneer of cockiness. “Anyway, if you’re still feeling shy you can shield those pretty blue eyes with your tin toga. You can pretend not to peek and I’ll pretend not to notice.”  
  
“I-- Wha-- Pfft! I didn’t peek!” Max sputters.   
  
“Mhm, sure you didn’t. And I didn’t notice. See? We’re good at this.” Chloe picks up the emergency blanket and tosses it to Max. Max lets it fall to the ground, folding her arms over her chest defiantly and leaning against the wall with exaggerated nonchalance. “Now,” Chloe continues, “avert your eyes lest ye be turned to stone.” There’s a hint of a dare in her voice. Max glowers at her. Chloe grips the hem of her tank top. “For reals, Caulfield. Shirt coming off in 3… 2… 1…”  
  
Max blushes and pulls her borrowed beanie down over her eyes, pretending not to hear Chloe’s teasing laughter. She slides her back down the wall and sits red-faced in the dark until Chloe’s body finally drops down next to her. “Coast’s clear, Long Max Silver. Your virtue is still intact.” She nudges Max’s arm. “Dunno what you’re so worked up about, anyway. It’s not like I didn’t moon you all the time when we were tweens.”  
  
A laugh bursts out of Max at the unexpected reminder. “You mooned _everybody_.”  
  
“And yet I was never popular with anyone but you. Funny, that.”  
  
“Also, I’m not ‘worked up’ about anything. Get over yourself.”  
  
“Tell that to your face.” Chloe tugs her hat back to uncover Max’s eyes. “So, are you hungry?” She smirks, leaning in close and dropping her voice low. “Or are you just thirsty?” She looks different in her backup clothes: softer, more like the girl Max used to know. Jeans well worn in but not nearly as tattered, feet socked but shoeless, the long sleeves of her thermal undershirt hiding her tattoo, a t-shirt for a band Max has never heard of layered over it, bullet necklace tucked away beneath the layers… Max can almost imagine that she had never left, that nothing had ever changed, that they were still the same people they had been back then. If it weren’t for the mischievous look on Chloe’s face so close to hers and the way her uncovered blue hair hangs in damp strands around that face the same way it did when they broke into the Blackwell pool...  
  
Max shoves her away playfully, trying to will away the racing of her heart. “Ugh! You are un-freaking-believable.” She places a hand over her own stomach. “I actually am hungry, though, if that was a serious question. And thirsty.” A wolfish grin spreads across Chloe’s face and Max quickly adds, “Like, _actually_ thirsty, not urban dictionary thirsty. Think you can turn off the charm long enough to eat?”  
  
“I don’t know; can _you_?” Chloe clambers to her feet with a chuckle and walks over to the supplies. “Okay, okay. Let’s get some food and water in you.” She grabs a pouch of stew, a collapsible camping spork, and the bottle of water, opening them each in turn and handing them to Max before sitting down next to her. “You should probably eat slow. Your body’s been through a lot today.”  
  
Max tries to take her advice, but it isn’t easy when her stomach starts growling ravenously at the first scent of food. Chloe’s watching her like a hawk, though, so she makes herself chew slowly instead of inhaling the entire package at once. “Aren’t you going to eat?” she asks after a couple of minutes, when her hunger has been sated enough for her to start processing thoughts again.  
  
“Nah, I’m good. I had some down at the truck.” Chloe picks up the water bottle sitting next to Max and raises it toward her. “Here, don’t forget to drink.” She watches with a satisfied smile as Max takes the bottle and lifts it to her lips. “Small sips,” she advises. “Don’t want to make yourself sick.”  
  
“When’d you get so good at taking care of people?” Max asks between sips.  
  
Chloe leans her back against the wall and shrugs slightly. “Did a lot of partying after you left.” She chuckles at Max’s puzzled expression. “Nursed a lot of people through hangovers,” she explains. She rubs the back of her neck and looks somewhat sheepish. “Myself included.”  
  
Max nods vaguely and resumes digging into the pouch of food, keeping her mouth occupied because she doesn’t really know how to respond to that. It’s not like she can really relate. “This actually isn’t terrible,” she says with a slight note of surprise now that the food is starting to register with her taste buds. It’s weird eating cold stew, the texture coming across slimier than she’d like, but the taste is better than she’d expected.  
  
Chloe gives a sarcastic but amused huff. “Glad to hear it’s up to your royal standards, Queen Maxine,” she teases. “For a minute there I was worried I’d have to haul a microwave up the hill. And, you know, fix the power grid.”  
  
“Ugh,” Max groans, “gross. Don’t call me that.” She swallows another cold, lumpy mouthful of soup. “A microwave _would_ be really nice, though. Or a campfire.” She glances around the small, enclosed space. “Probably a bad idea in here, though.”  
  
Chloe draws her knees up and rests her chin against them, gazing at Max affectionately. “Y’know, maybe we should try to swing by Casa Price before we book it outta town. Sergeant Paranoia’s got a whole apocalypse-stash of self-heating military surplus grub in the garage we could raid for road-snacks.”  
  
Max snorts, almost choking. “‘Sergeant Paranoia’s apocalypse-stash.’ This from the girl with a literal zombie apocalypse kit in her truck.”  
  
“Hey, it pays to be prepared. I never said it didn’t. Are you complaining?”  
  
“Not at all.” Max raises a sporkful of food toward Chloe. “Sure I can’t tempt you?”  
  
“Oh, you can tempt me, Caulfield, but not with that.” Chloe smiles flirtatiously, but it doesn’t quite touch her eyes. It’s such a small thing that Max almost doesn’t notice it at first. By the time Max has emptied the pouch and most of the water bottle, it’s become a definite pattern: a suggestive comment here, a tease there, followed every time by a smile that falters before it reaches Chloe’s eyes. In those moments - the moments where Chloe’s smile seems to die on her lips - Max can feel a subtle shift in her gaze, as if Chloe is looking not _at_ her but _through_ her. As if she’s not seeing Max at all. As if she’s looking for someone else.  
  
It’s warmer in Rachel’s clothes, the flannel and denim soft and cozy where the emergency blanket had been awkward and crinkly. Even so, it’s hard to be comfortable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For whatever reason, this chapter took forever and a day to sort out. I spent way too much time figuring out the food for one thing (most emergency/camping food is freeze-dried, and I wanted prep to be really straight-forward). To keep up to date on progress for NTTWIO & other fics, occasional sneak peaks, and more of me overthinking small details, check out my tumblr: https://ghost-in-the-hella.tumblr.com/


	4. 1.4 Beacon of Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The top of the lighthouse is a good place to get a look at everything. Everything.
> 
> Still 10/11, right around the golden hour.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title snagged from the Engine 54 song Eyes Wide Open.

Act I: Dawn of Time

Ch 4: Beacon of Light

 

Blue smoke trails up from Chloe’s cigarette, drifting cloudlike out over the bay before it fades into the golden sky. The sun is huge and glowing where it touches the horizon. It paints everything with its color, soft and warm and brilliant, the waves of the bay undulating like molten gold. It’s… fucking _beautiful_. It’s prettier than it has any right to be.   
  
It feels like the world has already forgotten. Like the sky has forgotten its fury; like the clouds have forgotten how they raged; like the waves have forgotten all the souls they swallowed.  
  
It’s only been a few hours since Chloe’s white-knuckle drive through the storm to get them to the beach, dodging chunks of flying debris big enough to sweep her truck off the road while Max quietly panicked in the passenger’s seat and waited for her present to catch up with her past. How could the world forget so quickly? Chloe turns away from the too-beautiful waves and looks inland, where the storm has not yet been forgotten. She takes a deep drag, pulls the smoke into her lungs until they ache, and hopes it’ll calm her nerves. It helps a little. Not enough. Definitely not enough to make her forget.  
  
Just a few short hours ago the lighthouse beacon shone brightly through the monstrous storm, its light blazing in a wide arc over land and water. Its light would’ve been small comfort to any ship that saw it through the storm, but it served its purpose as a guide nevertheless. Chloe had followed that light up the hill as she staggered toward her destination, half-blinded by the slashing rain and impeded by the weight of Max’s feet dragging through mud as she muttered in her delirium.   
  
Max had told her that the lighthouse would keep them safe. That was the only thought Chloe had allowed into her mind through the harrowing uphill trudge. Not thoughts about what caused the storm or what it might do. Not thoughts about where Max had gone in her head, or the horrible words that kept slipping from her tongue, or whether she would ever come back again. Not thoughts about Rachel, or Nathan, or Mark Jefferson, or how many times, _how many times_ Max had pulled her back from death. Only this simple equation, as if it had been carved into her brain with her pocket knife: Max + Chloe + lighthouse = safe.  
  
Just a few short hours ago Chloe had watched that beacon of safety and refuge extinguish as it was struck from its perch and sent tumbling into the waves below. Her heart had fallen with it. If it had only been her - if she hadn’t been responsible for Max’s safety - she might have given up right there and then: less than a quarter of a mile from shelter. With Max’s limp arm slung over her shoulder she had climbed dutifully onward, the near-constant flashes of lightning illuminating the flooded and all but unrecognizable path. The lighthouse, when she’d reached it, was more horrifying up close. The lantern had taken with it a substantial portion of the lighthouse itself when it fell. Part of the winding metal staircase rose from the gaping wound like a spine exposed to the elements. Maybe half the balcony remained, its edges jagged and uneven like a mouthful of broken teeth.   
  
While the storm still rampaged, Chloe had only had a few seconds to take in this devastation before Max came to. When she had gone out to the truck afterward, the state of the lighthouse had barely seemed worth noting compared to the total destruction which surrounded it. But in the hour or so that Max has been having her post-meal nap downstairs, Chloe has had time to get a proper look at the damage to the lighthouse up close and personal. And up close, it’s worse than she’d imagined. Even the golden glow of the setting sun doesn’t soften it. The surviving stairs dangle terrifyingly into space. The balcony looks ready to crumble and give way completely.  
  
The top of the lighthouse is probably the worst possible place for Chloe to be, so naturally that’s exactly where she is.  
  
She doesn’t know why, but she can’t handle Max’s stillness. She knows Max needs to rest - she’s the one who persuaded her to do so - but seeing her so still and quiet, sleeping alone on the floor in Rachel’s clothes and the rumpled emergency blanket that saved her life, makes Chloe so uneasy she can’t stay in the same room. She wants to shake Max awake and see the light come on in her eyes. She wants to see her smile, hear her voice, hear her laugh, feel her warmth.   
  
She knows she should stay with Max and watch over her. She owes her that much. But she can’t. It makes her sick with guilt, but she can’t. She can’t sit still with Max like that, and she worries that the constant pacing, toe-tapping, and finger-drumming will keep Max from getting the rest she needs to recover.   
  
And since Chloe can’t stand to be the one place where she should be, she finds the worst place to be and she goes there instead. It’s a terrible idea, which she knows. For one thing, it would be a hell of a way to show her gratitude if she fell. For another, she has a much clearer view of everything from here.  
  
 _All_ of it.  
  
Especially the cloud of smoke still hovering over the black spot in the landscape where the Two Whales Diner ought to be. Chloe wonders how much this Max remembers of the time between the End of the World Party and the, well, actual _end of the world._ Does she remember telling Chloe? Does she remember breaking down and telling her _everything_ , a tearful confession as she bent over the pages of her journal? About the Dark Room, about Victoria in there with her, about San Francisco, about Chloe dead in the junkyard next to Rachel, about _everything_?  
  
About her mother’s diner and how all it would take is one shovel, one lousy shovel of sand to prevent it from going up in flames?  
  
 _One fucking shovel of sand._   
  
Chloe isn’t even sure that what she’s feeling is anger. Either that fire inside of her has burned out or it’s burning so intensely that she can’t even feel it anymore, her emotions playing in such a high key that they’ve canceled out into a white noise that feels almost more like awe.  
  
“Ahoy there! How fares the old crow’s nest?”  
  
Chloe’s so startled by the sudden voice that she drops her half-smoked cigarette onto her pants. “ _Shit!_ ” she hisses through her teeth, swatting at her thigh. “What’re you _doing_ , dude?” She picks up the cigarette from the ground between her feet, brushes off the filtered end, then pops it back between her lips as she moves to look down the staircase. There’s Max, standing in the same spot of the winding stairs that always froze her cold, waiting same as ever for Chloe to call down and dare her to come up. “I thought you were taking a nap.”  
  
“I was. Then I woke up and you were gone.” Max’s voice is small, suddenly, and Chloe’s heart sinks low in her chest.   
  
“Sorry, I…”  
  
“Needed a smoke?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
Max waits. “I wasn’t sure where you went.”  
  
“Well, you figured it out.” Chloe winces. Her words sound harsher than she feels. “You should be taking it easy,” she says, forcing her voice to be gentle. “You had a near-death experience today; you shouldn’t be pushing yourself with all these stairs.”  
  
Max’s reply is so quiet Chloe can barely hear it, but it cuts through her like a knife. “You did, too.”  
  
It isn’t fair. None of this is fair. Chloe takes an impatient drag on her cigarette. She doesn’t even taste it, but it burns her throat a little. “I’m _not_ daring you,” she announces, turning and leaning against the railing. Considering that half of it is gone, it bears her weight with surprisingly little protest. “I’ll be down in a minute. You can wait there.”  
  
“I’m not ten, Chloe. You don’t have to dare me to do anything.” There’s a moment of silence, then Chloe hears the metallic clank of Max’s foot on the steep, narrow stairs. She turns in surprise. Sure enough, a minute later Max emerges looking both haggard and triumphant.  
  
Chloe feels sick. Of all times for Max to grow a spine, why _now?_ “Y-you shouldn’t… Fuck, Max, it’s _dangerous_ up here.”  
  
But Max can be just as stubborn as Chloe in her own way. She pushes past Chloe’s objections and climbs to the top of what’s left of the stairs. “What’re you talking about; it’s not that bad up--” It’s there that she hesitates once more, her brow furrowed. Chloe had frozen at that spot, too. The stairs were sturdy enough, but the gap between their breaking point and the ledge of the balcony’s remains was dizzying. It was only a distance of about a foot across, nothing that couldn’t easily be stepped over, but there was something about the combination of the twisted metal where the stairs broke off and the cavernous darkness that stretched down the height of the lighthouse below that made it seem much greater than that.  
  
Max doesn’t look scared. The expression on her face is closer to confusion. “Do you feel that?” she whispers.   
  
“Feel what?” Ash drops from the end of Chloe’s cigarette and scatters down the front of her shirt. She brushes it off with one hand.  
  
If Max hears Chloe’s question, she doesn’t answer it. Her brow furrows. “ _What **is** that?_ ” Her voice drops to a hiss, driving a spike of alarm into Chloe’s heart that sends her pulse soaring.   
  
“What is what?” Chloe asks, keeping her voice as calm and placating as she can.  
  
Max’s eyes dart frantically over the gap in front of her. “The railing…” she says after a long silence. She squints, her eyes still dancing over the emptiness as if she can read something there. “The stairs…” She shakes her head hard as if to clear it. She lifts her foot and before the thought can fully register in Chloe’s mind that Max is going to step directly into the void she’s already grabbing Max around the waist and pulling her over it to safety.   
  
“Are you out of your _fucking mind_???”  
  
Max’s hands close instinctively on Chloe’s shoulders to steady herself, but as soon as her feet are on solid ground she pushes back to look at her. She still doesn’t look scared, more dazed and vaguely concerned. And hurt, Chloe realizes with an immediate wave of guilt.  
  
“I-I didn’t mean to yell at you, I--” Chloe thinks she should probably let go of her and give her space after shouting in her face, but she’s terrified that if she does Max will do something stupid and dangerous again and maybe her reflexes won’t be quick enough this time. A laugh that’s all nerves and absolutely no humor forces its way out of her lungs. “I _panicked_. I’m… I’m sorry.” Her hands are twisted into fists in the shirt Max is wearing, and they’re shaking slightly. She forces them to unclench, releasing her hold. She wipes her clammy palms on her pants. “Just… be careful, okay? This thing’s falling apart. You could get hurt.”  
  
The confusion on Max’s face deepens, as does the concern. She lifts one hand from Chloe’s shoulder to touch her face lightly, and Chloe has the feeling that she’s now the one whose sanity is being called into question. Suddenly, Max is laughing. There’s an instability to it, a rush of hysterical giggles that seems ghoulishly out of place, and she leans forward quickly and braces her forehead against Chloe’s sternum.   
  
Operating on instinct, Chloe’s arms rise to wrap themselves around Max in a comforting embrace. Her limbs stutter, stop short, fall back to her sides. Without panic driving her movements, it feels too strange to hold Max when she’s dressed like… that. It feels like a betrayal, but who exactly she’s betraying she isn’t really sure. “What? What’s funny?” She hates how tight her throat is, how tense her words come out.   
  
“Nothing.” Max’s giggles subside. “It isn’t funny at all. Just… I’m used to being the one worried about _you_ , and now you’re…” She lets go and steps back. Chloe’s hand reaches out to grab her, then stops. They’re both on solid footing. “It _really_ isn’t funny.”  
  
“It really isn’t,” Chloe agrees. She stoops to pick up the cigarette smoldering on the ground. She doesn’t even remember spitting it out. From the state of the filter, it looks like her jaw clamped down on it pretty hard; if she’s not careful, biting cigarettes in half is going to become a habit. She flicks some grit off of it, then returns it to her mouth. She needs the nicotine more than she needs to appear dignified in this moment.  
  
“Oh, man, it’s kind of trippy up here…” Max’s eyes look like they’re having a hard time focusing. It does nothing to calm Chloe’s heightened nerves.   
  
“Yeah? I guess that’s one way of putting it.” She makes herself take a step back, leaning back against the rail of the balcony once more. The gesture looks casual, but she’s fully prepared to use the rail for leverage if she needs to leap to the rescue again. She takes a long drag on her cigarette, wishing it were something stronger, as Max joins her at the rail. Chloe turns and looks out at the bay with her.   
  
It’s easy to pretend, looking out at the water. If you can ignore the oppressive feeling in the air, can keep your eyes from wandering toward the land, can shake the nauseating vision that lingers like an afterimage over the waves.  
  
Max frowns as if she’s reading Chloe’s thoughts. “It feels… _wrong_.” She shakes her head.   
  
“Yeah.” Chloe finishes her cigarette and flicks it off the top of the lighthouse. “It’s fucked up. C’mon, let’s go back downstairs.” She puts an arm around Max’s waist to guide her, but Max slips free. “Max…”  
  
But it’s too late. Max follows the railing, turning toward land. Her breath catches in her throat in an audible gasp.  
  
“Max, please don’t do this to yourself…”  
  
“Oh, god… Oh my god…”  
  
Chloe gets to her side in time to steady her when her knees buckle and give way. “It isn’t your fault,” she tells her. It’s a lie, but it doesn’t feel like one when she says it. It sounds like one to Max, whose face contorts into a grief-stricken sneer. “It _isn’t_ your fault,” Chloe asserts, and maybe if she says it enough it’ll become true. “It isn’t.”  
  
Chloe wishes that Max would look away the way she did during the storm. She shouldn’t have to see this. It isn’t Max’s burden to carry. It really isn’t her fault. It’s Chloe’s.  
  
Because Chloe’s been staring at this for an hour, and she still can’t believe it. This is how much Max loves her. This is what it costs to love her.   
  
Nobody has ever loved her that much before. She’s not sure what to do with it. She’s not sure that she’s worth it.   
  
And she hopes against hope that Max isn’t thinking the same thing.  
  
Max says nothing for a long time. She just shakes her head sadly from time to time and lets Chloe hold onto her. “It’s wrong,” she says finally.  
  
Chloe’s heart constricts in her chest. Her arms tighten around Max subconsciously.  
  
“I thought that, somehow… when the storm was gone…” She makes a vague, confusing gesture with her hand that Chloe doesn’t follow, then tips her head up to look at her. “You feel it, too, don’t you?”  
  
“Feel what?”  
  
Max frowns and looks back out at the ruins of their town, all golden and smoldering in the dying light. “That feeling, like…” She sighs, annoyed at her inability to express what’s on her mind. “I thought it would, I don’t know, wash everything clean, like it would… Like it would be _over_. But it… Don’t you feel it?”  
  
Apart from the black smoke, the sky is clear. Chloe’s pretty sure she doesn’t feel _anything_. Worried about Max, maybe. But beyond that… Static. White noise. Numb. But the way that Max is looking at her, she obviously is expecting something else. “I’m not sure what you want me to feel.”  
  
“It’s not what I _want_ you to feel, it’s… The storm is gone, isn’t it?” She waves her hand out across the placid expanse of sky. “It’s over. It got what it wanted.” She closes a hand over Chloe’s arm and compresses. “Got its goddamned pound of flesh.” Her voice is bitter as ash. “So why doesn’t it feel like it’s gone?”  
  
“I-I don’t--”  
  
“You _don’t_ feel it, do you.” Max suddenly sounds exhausted. It’s almost an accusation. “That hum in the air, that… _feeling_ , almost like nausea and almost like electricity…” She sighs and sinks deeper into Chloe’s arms. “Never mind.”  
  
It’s petty, maybe, but Chloe feels stung by Max’s resignation. She thought that after everything they’ve been through together they were past this bullshit thing of shutting each other out. So what if Chloe doesn’t feel… humming, or nausea, or _whatever_? She can’t twist time in the palm of her hand, either, but Max made her believe it anyway. Why can’t she explain this to her, too?  
  
Because she’s fucking exhausted, Chloe reminds herself. Because it’s been less than a day, and they’re both barely keeping their heads together, and maybe it simply isn’t worth the energy it would take for Max to convince her.  
  
So Chloe just holds her a little tighter, and when she stares out at the fresh carcass of Arcadia Bay she tries to see it through Max’s eyes. It does look wrong, and in more than just the obvious “I spent my literal entire life in this shithole of a town and now it’s barely recognizable as a town at all” sort of way that one would expect. The thought had occurred to her earlier, once or twice, but she hadn’t really investigated it too deeply.   
  
“Something definitely does feel _off_ ,” Chloe says, searching for the right words to describe the vague feeling that’s been tickling unexamined at the back of her mind. “I don’t know if it’s what you mean, but…”  
  
Max tips her head back again, eyes curious and hopeful, and Chloe suddenly finds herself nervous that she’s going to disappoint her. Chloe started talking before she finished thinking, and normally that doesn’t trouble her but as soon as she sees that expectant look she realizes how much she doesn’t want to fuck this up.   
  
“Well…” Chloe presses on carefully, “Isn’t it too quiet?”   
  
Max raises an eyebrow, and Chloe already feels like she’s fucked this up. “Too quiet?” she repeats back.  
  
Chloe nods, even though “quiet” isn’t quite what she means, not really. “Yeah, sort of…” She sighs, frustrated. “Shouldn’t there be… I mean, noise, movement, _something?_ ” It isn’t coming out right. Max looks as confused as Chloe feels as she struggles to put this sensation into words. Only it’s such a vague thing, this feeling: barely formed as a thought in her mind, let alone words in her mouth. “Shouldn’t there be, I don’t know, _helicopters_ o-or something like that?”  
  
“Helicopters?”  
  
Chloe’s confusion tips easily over into anger. “Or _something_. Ambulances, fire trucks. Fuck, _news vans_. The weird weather stuff’s been all over the news all week. But a big fucking tornado wipes out an entire town and all of a sudden _nobody_ is interested? Where’s the camera crews? Fuck’s sakes, where’s the first responders? Where’s fucking FEMA or whatever?”  
  
There’s a good half a minute of silence while Max just stares back at her, blue eyes opaque and inscrutable. “Huh.” She shifts her gaze back to the town below, fingers absently stroking a soothing rhythm against Chloe’s forearm until Chloe remembers how breathe evenly again. “That’s not what I was thinking, but you’re totally right. Why _isn’t_ there anybody moving down there?”  
  
From the top of the lighthouse, the remains of Arcadia Bay look utterly still. Apart from the occasional bird overhead, there are no apparent signs of life. Which is bullshit. People survive natural disasters all the time. But even knowing this, it still feels like Max and Chloe are the only two people alive in Arcadia Bay.  
  
It feels like they’re the only two people alive in the world.  
  
They stand and watch the stillness until the last rays of sunset disappear and the town goes so dark they can’t see anything anymore. The town is black and illegible, but the sky opens up with more stars than either of them have ever seen before. It is, like the sunset on the bay, more beautiful than it has any right to be.   
  
There’s no light anywhere below them, save the emergency lights still glowing inside the lighthouse. They follow them down the stairs, Chloe escorting Max over the gap in the staircase, and back into the round, empty room that gave them shelter from the storm.   
  
There are too many things for them to say, and so they fall into silence. It’s still early, too early for Chloe to sleep but she’s completely worn out. They curl up together between the emergency blanket and the Jolly Roger on the hard floor. Max nestles right up against Chloe like she belongs there, like she’s always belonged there. She sleeps with her mouth close to Chloe’s throat so she can feel her heartbeat against her lips. “You’re alive,” she whispers, once, softly into Chloe’s skin, an answer to a question unasked except perhaps in whatever dream she’s having. The words and the warm breath that carries them send a thrill up Chloe’s spine, followed by a pang of guilt.   
  
Chloe holds her close and breathes her in. She can still smell a hint of Rachel on her clothes, but already that scent is nearly gone. Max smells like the rain. She smells like saltwater air, like electricity, like warmth. She smells faintly of sweat and, beneath that, a trace of soap, something sweet and floral. And still beneath that, another scent, one indefinable except as the scent of Max because it doesn’t smell like anything else. The scent of a hundred different sleepovers, a hundred different pirate adventures, a hundred different secrets whispered in pillow forts. And it’s this soft wave of nostalgia that lets Chloe’s mind relax and drift off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve been decent about sticking to the monthly release schedule, but there’s a good chance Chapter 5 might take longer. It needs a pretty drastic overhaul, and winter break is going to be a heavy writing/research time for my thesis so the chapter won’t be able to take high priority. Hoping it’ll be out sometime in February. Check my tumblr for updates (I know, I know, tumblr is a sinking ship, but I’m still on it for now): https://ghost-in-the-hella.tumblr.com/


	5. 1.5 Eye of the Beholder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s a brand new day, and Max is tired of being stuck in the lighthouse. What could go wrong?
> 
> 10/12, morning. That’s right, it’s finally not the day of the storm anymore!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, mid-May is definitely not February. Apologies for the 5-month delay between chapters while I was finishing my degree, and thank you for your patience. Since it’s been a bit, you can bring yourself back up to speed with this [recap](https://ghost-in-the-hella.tumblr.com/post/184944644529/nttwio-the-story-so-far) if needed. 
> 
> Chapter title snagged from my favorite Twilight Zone episode.

Act I: Dawn of Time  
Ch 5: Eye of the Beholder

  
  
Max wakes to the taste of the salt on Chloe’s skin and the steady pulsing of her heartbeat against her lips. Her own heart picks up its pace when the world comes into focus and her mind registers these sensations for what they are. The floor is hard and cold through the thin fabric of the pirate flag and the mylar blanket over them is crinkly and uncomfortable, but Max feels none of these things. She feels Chloe’s arms around her, the gentle stirring of Chloe’s breath in her hair, Chloe’s bare leg slung warm and heavy over her thigh, Chloe’s pulse strong and calm.  
  
She feels _Chloe_. She feels Chloe in her arms and _she’saliveshe’salive **she’salive**_ , and she’s so _close_.  
  
She’s so close that Max can feel her eyelashes brushing Chloe’s throat each time she blinks, so close she can’t even see anything that isn’t Chloe, can’t smell or feel or taste anything that isn’t Chloe.  
  
It’s almost too much.  
  
It’s not nearly enough.  
  
Max wants to hold onto this moment forever. She wants this more fiercely than she ever has before and in a way that no photograph could ever capture. The feeling overwhelms her: a swelling in her chest that’s all but unbearable, a surge of emotion that isn’t sure if it’s joy or pain or love or fear. She doesn’t want it to stop, but if it doesn’t stop it might tear her apart.  
  
She wants to live here. She wants to bury her face deeper still into Chloe’s neck and let herself sink utterly into their embrace. Her arms constrict around Chloe, and she has to hold herself back from squeezing as hard as she wants to for fear of hurting her. She’s rewarded with a soft, wordless mumble into her hair and a momentary tightening of Chloe’s arms around her.  
  
Eventually, Max forces herself to let go and reluctantly extricates herself from Chloe’s warmth. She could bask in it forever, but the urge feels selfish and she’s a little afraid of what might happen if she gives in to it. She stands and stretches, turning and twisting to release the stiffness in her muscles. Some of her joints pop unpleasantly.  
  
They must’ve crashed _hard_ last night. Apparently she didn’t even think to take off any of her layers first, crawling into their makeshift bed fully clothed before conking out. She’s a little surprised that after all the resting she did during the day she was still able to sleep through the night. Not too surprised, though. She always did sleep better next to Chloe.  
  
Chloe’s still out cold, even with the sharp light of morning beaming down from one of the small lighthouse windows directly onto her face. She looks so different when she’s sleeping. Softer. Her face is open and untroubled, the way it was for so many years before Max came back into her life. Max has missed that face.  
  
It feels like since Max’s return to Arcadia Bay, she’s seen Chloe’s defenses more than she’s seen Chloe. Always guarded, always closed off. Always wearing her thorny attitude like a suit of armor, always wielding her sharp tongue like a weapon. Even when she acts like she’s letting Max in, Max can still feel her pushing her away.  
  
Chloe was always tough, even when they were kids. She was the strong one. The brave one. The one who didn’t cry over every scraped knee. The one who never cowered when confronted by scolding parents or menacing bullies.  
  
She’s even stronger now. She’s had to be. She’s the kind of strong that comes from carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders from far too young of an age and for far too long. Max hopes she’s not the kind of strong that wouldn’t know what to do if that burden were ever put down.  
  
Max hopes she’s the kind of strong that can mend. She hopes she’s the kind of strong that can forgive.  
  
Max shivers and tries to tell herself it’s only because it’s colder outside the blanket.  
  
A sudden loud snore from Chloe snaps Max out of her contemplative funk. That much hasn’t changed, she reflects with a smile. Chloe’s snoring may be confined to just one or two brief snorts a night, but what it lacks in quantity it more than makes up for in volume.  
  
With a shake of her head and a fond chuckle, Max pads quietly over to the clothes draped over the railing, turning her back to Chloe. If she looks at her, she’ll only want to crawl back under the blanket and into her arms again. She touches her clothes and is relieved to find them dry enough to change into. She pauses and listens to Chloe’s steady breathing, then risks a glance to make sure her eyes are still closed in sleep.  
  
The clothes are stiff, crusted with salt and sand whipped into them by the storm. She brushes off as much of it as she can, but the ghost of it lingers. Unpleasant as her own clothes are right now, she’d rather wear them than stay in Rachel’s any longer than she has to. Rachel’s clothes are too full of memories, and none of them are hers.  
  
She takes off the flannel and folds it, placing it on one of the steps. She follows it with Rachel’s t-shirt, swiftly replacing it with her own bra. She’s not sure if Rachel didn’t pack a bra and underwear in the emergency kit or if Chloe had decided that giving Rachel’s personal underclothes to Max would be a bridge too far, but either way it’s a relief to get her bra back on. Not that she needs much support, but not wearing one makes her feel a little exposed. She grabs her own t-shirt off the railing, but before she can put it on she’s startled by a sound she’s never heard before: loud and high, somewhere between the wailing of a ghost and the crying of a lost puppy. The shirt drops from her fingers as she whips her head around to find the source.  
  
It’s _Chloe_ , she realizes with a shock. She’s whimpering in her sleep.  
  
Max approaches her gently and kneels beside her. Chloe’s face is scrunched up painfully. Her hands clasp at the emergency blanket, twitching and grasping. She’s pale and sweating, and the high-pitched keening she emits is utterly heartbreaking. Max stretches out a hand toward her, then hesitates. She doesn’t want to startle the sleeping woman, but she can’t bear the thought of Chloe dealing with whatever nightmare she’s having on her own. Tentatively, she strokes Chloe’s hair in as soothing of a gesture as she can, the way her mother used to stroke hers when she wasn’t feeling well. Chloe wakes with a sharp yelp, almost ripping the blanket as her hand spasms. Max falls backward onto her backside, hand still outstretched toward Chloe.  
  
For a long moment both women stare at each other, frozen in place, Chloe still panting with fear and Max stricken with nerves. Chloe’s eyes dart around the room, unseeing for a long while before slowly gaining focus and settling on Max. Her breathing slowly calms and steadies. Max, realizing her hand is still out, lowers it slowly to her side. “Are you okay?” she asks finally.  
  
Chloe blinks, her brain still trying to piece everything together and find solid purchase on reality. “Yeah… Yeah, I’m…” Her eyes flick quickly up and down Max’s figure sprawled awkwardly next to her. The look of horror fades from her expression. A look of pleasant surprise swiftly replaces it. “Oh! Hey there.” A smirk spreads over her lips. “You know, we’ve _gotta_ stop meeting like this. Or, y’know, meet like this _way_ more often.”  
  
Max is puzzled for a second, then flushes with embarrassment when she realizes that her shirt is still where she dropped it on the floor several yards away. “I, uh, you were… I was just…” She splutters inarticulately.  
  
Chloe’s eyes pass up and down her body again, slower this time, one eyebrow raised in a teasing suggestion. Max feels her face turn about six shades of red. Only Chloe Price could bounce back from a horrifying nightmare and promptly tease her into flustered insensibility. Max folds her arms over her chest. She isn’t even showing that much skin - Chloe has definitely seen more of her, and god she really doesn’t want to think about _that_ right now - but there’s something appraising in Chloe’s look that makes her shy. Not uncomfortable, exactly, but shy. She’s seen the women on Chloe’s walls, the photo of Rachel in her wallet. She knows she doesn’t measure up. Not by any metric. “I… Y-you were having a… a nightmare or something.”  
  
“So you decided to cheer me up by taking your shirt off? Your methods are a little unorthodox, but I like your style, Caulfield.”  
  
Max laughs and shakes her head in disbelief. “I was _worried_ about you, you ass.” She gets up. “But apparently you’re fine, so if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to finish getting changed.”  
  
“Okay, awesome.” Chloe strikes a lounging pose, propping her head up on one raised fist and watching Max as she walks over to the railing to retrieve the rest of her clothes. “Don’t mind me. I’ll be right here.”  
  
Max picks her shirt up from the ground and pulls it on. Chloe’s still grinning at her cartoonishly. “Are you cereal?”  
  
“What?” Chloe asks, the picture of innocence.  
  
“Are you really planning on staring at me the whole time?”  
  
“I mean, you know I’m not big on planning but I’d hate to pass up a good opportunity,” she teases playfully. “Why? Feeling self-conscious?”  
  
“Uh… _Yeah_ , kinda.”  
  
Chloe’s smile flickers but doesn’t go away. “Oh. Really?”  
  
“Yes, really, so could you please just _not_?”  
  
Looking chastened, Chloe closes her eyes and rolls onto her back so she’s facing the ceiling. “Yeah, of course. I… I was only kidding around; I didn’t mean to make you actually uncomfortable.” The playfulness has gone out of her voice. She sounds not hurt but tentative, nervous that she’s overstepped a line. She anxiously fidgets with her fingers. “...Were you always so shy about getting changed? We played dress-up all the time when we were younger. You didn’t seem to care about it then.”  
  
When she’s sure that Chloe isn’t watching her anymore, Max unzips Rachel’s jeans. “It’s… _different_ , now.” She snatches her underwear off the railing and trades it for the jeans as quickly as she can without falling over.  
  
“How so?”  
  
Max can’t quite read Chloe’s voice. Is she really that dense, or is she seeking confirmation? “If you don’t know, I’m not going to spell it out for you.” Max pulls on her own jeans before folding Rachel’s and adding them to the pile of her clothes. She looks back at Chloe, still patiently lying on her back with her eyes closed, the blanket drawn down on one side where Max had so recently been sleeping curled up in her arms. “Okay, I’m ready. You can open your eyes.”  
  
Chloe waits a few more seconds before she does, rolling back onto her side to look at Max again. The cocky look is gone from her face, but her smile is encouraging. “I’m glad your clothes are dry. You look more… _you_.” Her smile broadens. “I notice you’re still wearing my hat, though.”  
  
Max touches the beanie and returns her smile. “You want it back?”  
  
“Nah, it looks good. Really pulls the whole look together.”  
  
“Good, because I wasn’t going to give it back anyway.”  
  
Chloe seems pleased by her response. She wrestles her way out of the tangled blanket and cracks her neck. “Shit, wish I had pillows in the zombie kit. This stone floor is killing me.” She freezes for a second and shoots Max a guilty glance. “Uh. It’s bothering my neck, I mean. How’re you feeling?”  
  
Max stretches. “Kinda stiff,” she replies. “But not too bad. Better than I felt yesterday, that’s for sure. Steady on my feet. Head’s clear… Well, clear enough.” Her stomach growls and she places one hand on it. “Hungry.”  
  
“We should have enough food left up here for breakfast.” Chloe gets up and tugs back on the bluejeans she’d discarded by their bedside last night. She snatches her bra up off the floor, gives it a sniff, then shrugs and starts putting it on under her shirt. Max catches sight of an expanse of bare stomach as Chloe maneuvers and quickly becomes absorbed in examining the floor. The stones are so rough and uneven: clearly it wasn’t designed for being slept on. It’s a wonder they never brained themselves by tripping over them when they used to run around the lighthouse like maniacs. Max looks up again when she hears Chloe rustling in their supply stash. “I’ll need to grab more food from the truck if we want anything crazy like lunch or dinner today, though,” Chloe continues. “Should probably start working on the truck, too. See if I can get that beast up and running.”  
  
Something cold and heavy settles in the pit of Max’s stomach. “Alone?”  
  
Chloe glances at Max over her shoulder as she picks up a couple of granola bars. “I mean, yeah. It’s a pretty long walk down the hill, and you should--”  
  
“I just told you, I’m steady on my feet again. I feel fine. I want to go with you.”  
  
Chloe walks over and holds out a granola bar to Max. She doesn’t take it. “Max…” Chloe sighs. “It’s not that I _want_ to go alone. Believe me, I’d rather be holed up here with you. But the truck isn’t going to fix itself, and it’s our best bet for getting out of here. You may feel better, but I doubt you’re up for walking all the way out of town.”  
  
Max folds her arms over her chest. “I’m going with you.”  
  
“Max…” Chloe’s eyes swim with nameless feelings. Her voice goes soft and she lowers her outstretched arm to her side. “It… It really isn’t okay out there. I know you got a look yesterday, but… It’s bad enough from the top of the lighthouse. It’s way worse actually walking around in it.”  
  
“I can handle it.”  
  
The look that wrenches Chloe’s face might be pity, but it also might be doubt. “I can barely handle it, and I’m not the one--” She cuts herself off, almost biting her tongue in her abruptness. She shakes her head as if to erase the words. “Look. It’s _bad_. And I don’t want you to have…” She sighs. “Fuck. _I don’t want to have to see you seeing it._ ” She looks embarrassed. “Is that… totally selfish?”  
  
The meaning of Chloe’s words sinks in slowly. “You… You think I’m going to regret my decision?”  
  
Chloe doesn’t respond verbally, but the agonized expression on her face is eloquent enough. She should never have to look that way. She should never have to doubt her worth in Max’s eyes.  
  
Max steps forward slowly and with caution. “Chloe, I want you to listen to me very carefully.” Chloe’s eyes flicker toward Max then slide guiltily away again. She gives a small nod. She’s listening. Max reaches out and gently closes her fingers over Chloe’s hand. “There is _no_ amount of destruction that would make me sorry that you’re alive. _None_.” Max trembles slightly under the weight of her conviction.  
  
“Max--”  
  
“ ** _None_**. I’m sure…” Max takes a deep breath to steady herself. “I’m sure that it won’t be easy. I’m sure that you’re right, and it’s going to be a waking nightmare out there. And maybe I’ll break down and cry, or I’ll flip the fuck out and start screaming about how unfair it all is or how guilty I feel about it, but no matter what - _no matter what_ \- I _won’t_ be sorry that you’re alive. That just isn’t going to happen.” She squeezes Chloe’s hand. She can feel some of the tension easing out of it.  
  
“And if I do break down,” Max continues, “that’ll be hard for you to see. I hope you don’t have to go through that. But, Chloe, I can’t stay in here forever. Eventually, I’m going to have to go outside.” She offers Chloe a gentle smile. It only shakes a little. “Besides, if you’re working on the truck you’ll be gone for hours, and I don’t want to let you out of my sight for that long. Or, you know, at all.”  
  
Max rubs her thumb against the side of Chloe’s hand, then pulls back and takes one of the granola bars from it. “So let’s eat. Then we’ll go out to the truck. I’ll take it nice and easy on the way down, I promise. If I get too tired, I’ll rest. I’ll be fine. And then you can fix up the truck, and I’ll just sit back and admire you while you butch it up under the hood, okay?”  
  
Chloe pushes out a strained chuckle at that, then heaves a resigned sigh. “You’re really not going to back down on this, are you?”  
  
“Nope. If you walk out that door without me, I’ll follow you down on my own. And then you’ll have to worry about an angry Max stalking you down the hill.”  
  
“A… _mad_ Max, would you say?”  
  
A genuine smile spreads across Max’s lips. “I’m sure _you_ would. So, what’s it going to be? We walk down to the truck together and you get to impress me with your mechanical prowess, or you try to lock me away like some damsel in distress and I go Mad Max on your punk ass?”  
  
“Well, when you put it like _that_ …”  
  
Max makes short work of her granola bar while Chloe works her way through hers with uncharacteristic slowness, actually chewing before swallowing for once. Max tries not to show her impatience with Chloe’s obvious heel-dragging, instead busying her hands with tidying up their bedding, organizing their handful of remaining supplies, zippering her hoodie to keep out the lingering chill after the storm, dislodging the chair that holds the broken door fully closed. When Chloe finally finishes her breakfast (and disposes of the wrapper in the appropriate bin at Max’s insistence), Max is already waiting for her at the door, ready to push it open.  
  
What remains of the shack right outside the lighthouse door is the first thing Max sees when she steps outside. She had braced herself to see total devastation, but this…  
  
This is _not_ what she expected.  
  
“Holy shit,” she breathes, her face drawn tight with alarm.  
  
Chloe’s hand falls to her shoulder. “I know, it’s pretty fucked up. But, you know, it’s not like it was that structurally sound to begin with,” she tries to reassure her.  
  
“No…” Max shakes her head and takes a step forward, hardly noticing as Chloe’s hand drops from her shoulder. “It isn’t that. It’s… _WRONG_.” She turns to look at Chloe with searching eyes. Chloe seems nonplussed. “You don’t see that?”  
  
“I… see that it’s pretty flattened, yeah.”  
  
Max’s face contorts with disbelief. “It’s _flattened_. _That’s_ what you see.”  
  
“...Yeah?”  
  
Max takes another hesitant step forward. “You… That’s really all you see?”  
  
Alarm creeps into Chloe’s voice. “What do _you_ see? Max?”  
  
Another step forward. She doesn’t know how to put what she sees into words. The building is razed to the ground. Rubble. Bits and pieces sticking out at odd angles, broken glass, crumbled concrete, twisted metal…  
  
But it also isn’t.  
  
The building is standing, its structure stable, untouched by the storm.  
  
It’s broken but whole, shattered but sound. It shimmers like a mirage, like something impossible. Like something caught between worlds. Between moments.  
  
Max remembers the strange flickering of the stairs at the top of the lighthouse the night before and the way Chloe had flipped out and hauled her over when she tried to step onto them. It hadn’t looked quite right, but it had been easy enough to dismiss as a trick of the dying light and an exhausted, distressed mind. But the light is sharp and clear today, and there’s no mistaking what she’s seeing.  
  
But what she’s seeing is _impossible_. She thought she was feeling better, but could she be hallucinating? Seeing double? She reaches out her hand and walks toward the flickering building.  
  
“Max, what’re you doing?” Chloe follows after her, her voice pitched high and strained with nerves. “Be careful, okay? There’s a lot of broken glass, and I know I’m pretty hardcore and everything but I don’t think I can stomach giving you stitches.”  
  
It’s solid, but it wavers. It’s here and it isn’t. “This looks right to you? It’s just… wrecked? Just a wrecked building?”  
  
“Of course it is. What’re you--”  
  
Max touches her hand to one glimmering, flickering wall.  
  
The world  
  
                        stutters.

  
  
_“MAX!”_

  
  
\--what Max feels isn’t _pain_ , exactly--

  
  
(that)  
                         (unthat)

  
\--it’s more like…--

  
(there)  
                          (unthere)

  
\--a profound disorientation--

  
(then)  
                          (unthen)

  
\--everything is--

  
(here)  
                          (unhere)

  
\--unstable and--

  
(Max)  
                          (unMax)

  
\--there’s nothing--

  
(Chloe)  
                          (unChloe)

  
\--she can hold onto--

  
  
Max falls onto her back with a hard thud, crashing into Chloe’s body. The air rushes back into her lungs as soon as her hand separates from the building. She gasps as if she’s been drowning, and maybe she has been. They’re sprawled on the dirt in front of the shack, Chloe’s hands clamped onto her shoulders.  
  
“What the _fuck_ was that?” Chloe sounds near hysteria.  
  
Max closes her eyes. The world is solid again, but nausea swims in her stomach temporarily.  
  
“Max! What _happened_? Talk to me!”  
  
“I’m okay,” she heaves. “ _Fuck_.” Chloe’s grip on her is so tight it hurts.  
  
“Don’t tell me you’re okay! You just fucking collapsed!” Chloe turns Max around and stares intently into her eyes, checking her pupils. “What _was_ that, Max? Did you faint? Did something… Fuck, I don’t know, hit you or bite you or…?”  
  
“I don’t know. I’m okay, though; I feel fine now.” Max tries to brush Chloe’s hands away.  
  
Max’s words clearly do nothing to calm Chloe; if anything, she looks more upset. “You don’t know what happened? Was that a _seizure_? Did you, like, black out or--?”  
  
“Chloe, it’s fine, really.” It isn’t fine, really. The truth is that Max wants to know what happened just as badly as Chloe does. But more than that, Max wants Chloe to stop freaking out, so she puts on the calmest face she can manage and smiles at her bravely. “I must’ve tripped on a piece of wood or something. I’ll be more careful. Let’s just--”  
  
“ _Nope_.” Chloe’s eyes are hard as steel. Max can’t look away from them. “Nope, nope, nope, nope, _nope_. A whole fucking _planet_ of nope.”  
  
“Chloe, seriously. You’re overreacting. I tripped; I’m fine.”  
  
“Fuuuuuuuuuck no. I know what it looks like when people trip. That was-- I don’t know what that was, but it was _not_ you tripping over something. I’m not stupid, Max.” When Max tries to dodge her eyes, Chloe touches her chin and guides her back until they’re eye to eye. “What did you see?” she asks, more gently. “Right before you collapsed, you were talking like you were seeing something weird. Something I couldn’t see. What was it?”  
  
Max shifts uncomfortably under the intensity of her gaze. “The shack,” she mumbles.  
  
“What about it?” Chloe glances over at it. “What do you see?”  
  
“It’s still there. Only… it isn’t, is it?” The shack shimmers and blurs at the edges of Max’s vision. “You can’t see it. The storm destroyed it.”  
  
“But _you_ still see it.”  
  
Max nods reluctantly.  
  
“You tried to touch it. That’s what you were reaching for? And you almost passed out.”  
  
Max nods again.  
  
“Okay, fuck this shit. I know you say you feel better, but clearly you’re _not_ okay. Please, Max, _please_ go back in the lighthouse and just sleep for the rest of the day. This adrenaline high’s been fun and all, but I’m about tapped out. If you collapse again, I don’t know if I can carry you. I’ll fix up the truck, or I’ll find another working vehicle, and then I’m taking you to the hospital so you can get checked out by someone who actually _knows what they’re doing_ , because this is way above my level.”  
  
Max places a hand over Chloe’s, still gripping her shoulder. “Chloe, I know it sounds weird, and I don’t know what’s going on either, but I’m not staying here alone.” She sees Chloe open her mouth to protest and cuts her off. “If you can get the truck up and running today, you can go right ahead and drive me to the hospital. I’ll go happily! But I’m not sitting around, twiddling my thumbs, and waiting for you. I mean, what’re you going to do if you do fix the truck? You gonna drive it up through the woods to the lighthouse so I don’t have to go outside?”  
  
Chloe frowns, obviously annoyed. “If I have to.”  
  
“It’ll never make it through the trees and you know it! Are you gonna carry me down the hill? It’s at least a mile down, and it’s steep. You’ll only throw your back out and probably drop me a dozen times. Look, you said so yourself last night: there aren’t any first responders. Nobody’s coming to save us. The only way I’m getting out of here, to the hospital or anywhere, is on my own two feet.” Max lets go of Chloe’s hand, rises to her feet, and starts walking resolutely toward the trail. “So deal with it.” Max calls back to Chloe without looking, “Are you coming with me or not?”  
  
There’s a moment of stunned silence followed by a flurry of scuffling noises and grumbled profanity as Chloe scrambles to join her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for your patience! I’m hoping to get this story back onto its monthly schedule now, so updates should be coming more frequently. There’s some good stuff coming up that I’m excited to share with you, so stay tuned!

**Author's Note:**

> The road may be rough at times, but thank you for taking this journey with me.
> 
> Grad school is basically like having your ego get body-checked every couple of days, so comments and kudos are always greatly appreciated!
> 
> Perpetual thanks to my amazing partner "Velmax" for all of your support, assistance, and suggestions.


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